By David G. Styles. By studying military enrollment and conflict, this book traces the story of the African American quest for freedom and liberty from the days of the Revolutionary War to the 21st Century. It follows the earliest struggle for liberty from slavery, when some 200,000 African American slaves and free men fought on both sides in return for the promise of freedom. Some, but pitifully few, did achieve their freedom, though most returned to the lot that had been dealt to them by their owners and the abolition of slavery did not give them equality. The Spanish American War was followed twenty years later by the “Great War” – the war to end all wars, where over three hundred African American soldiers were awarded the Croix de Guerre, France’s highest award for valor, yet only one was awarded the Medal of Honor by the United States – seventy-three years after his death on the battlefield.

World War II brought the first all-black-crewed fighter squadron, the 99th, followed by the 332nd Fighter Group, the most highly decorated group of men in their theaters of war. These men were also the catalyst of political action to bring desegregation to the Armed Forces, by means of President Harry Truman’s Executive Order 9981, which preceded the Civil Rights Act by twenty years. Since President Lyndon Johnson’s signing of the Civil Rights Act into law, we have seen sometimes great, but faltering, steps forward. African Americans have finally risen to the top in their chosen careers – four-star generals, astronauts and ultimately an African American President.

• Hardcover
• 207mm x 234mm
• 296 pages

Click here to view sample pages